Steven Spielberg horrifyingly misreads the current state of the world in Disclosure Day such that the whole thing hinges on human beings doing the following:

  • Having an attention span
  • Voluntarily watching the news
  • Learning information that then alters their thinking about something
  • Shrugging their shoulders at a threat to their religious belief

Give me your xenomorphs, your crop circles, your UFOs yearning to break free of earth’s atmosphere. I will suspend my disbelief so mightily you’ll say “Wow, look at that disbelief so high up there.” But if you look me in the eyes and tell me that anyone alive in the world right now would watch a video of something and change their mind, I will throw that disbelief at you hard.

One more thing before we get into the meat of the movie. If you are going to make a movie in which the visual evidence of an alien is staggering and overwhelming, you really need to have aliens that appear visually staggering and overwhelming. You cannot have CGI effects for extraterrestrials that immediately make you think “Oh wow, that looks fake” in a movie that relies entirely on people seeing footage of an alien and thinking “Oh wow, aliens are real!”

I have less problems with the marketing of Disclosure Day, even though it absolutely promised some kind of a twist that never comes. Applaudably, screenwriter David Koepp doesn’t slow burn us but opts to throw us into an overheated frying pan. Daniel (Josh O’Connor) has stolen what we know going in are alien-related secrets from a shady private contractor group that has been hiding such evidence on behalf of the government for decades. That group’s leader, Noah Scanlon (Colin Firth), has kidnapped Daniel’s girlfriend, Jane (Eve Hewson), to trade for the stolen goods.

After the use of an alien technology MacGuffin that will be used ad nauseum, Daniel and Jane are on the run. Hugo (Colman Domingo) is masterminding how the E.T. videos will be revealed. He steers the couple toward Margaret (Emily Blunt), a meteorologist who suddenly started speaking an otherworldly language while on TV. That barely gets you an hour into the movie, and nothing surprising happens after that.

Blunt and O’Connor are captivating. Alone and together, they make an otherwise laughably bad endeavor almost enjoyable. Almost. Because ultimately, Disclosure Day is a movie that says “what if the people who do their own research are right?” It may not be the last thing we need, but celebrating conspiracy theorists is why they invented podcasts. It is also littered with some of the laziest, inexplicable nonsense. The weird stuff with animals has no meaningful payoff. The clicking alien language happens twice, the second time leading to a moment my eyes have still not finished rolling at. It is all so slapped together and silly.

If it sounds like this is overly harsh, that is because I hated this movie. A lot. Were it not for Blunt, O’Connor, and the fact that Spielberg can’t help but make a really good-looking flick that periodically sucks you in, this review would have had some even grumpier title like “The second worst D-day ever.” I’m glad that I didn’t have to do that.

Grade = D

Other Critical Voices to Consider

Emmet Asher-Perrin at Reactor says “This isn’t an era to tout The Magic Solution to Everything—rather, it’s an era that needs constant reminding that avoiding the end of the world is work. Work that we all have to show up for. I walked into the theater hoping for that good ol’ Spielbergian wonder and awe. What I got was a potent reminder that it’s bad out there, folks. Real bad.”

Amy Nicholson at the L.A. Times says “Last month’s infodump of an Armed Forces report listing 209 sightings of unidentified objects was announced with a presidential tweet that ‘the people can decide for themselves.’ I didn’t bother to click. Did you?”

Leslie Combemale at the Alliance of Women Film Journalists says “this film fits well as a third cinematic statement from the director of Close Encounters and E.T., and offers eye-popping visuals and committed performances enough to make it well worthy of carrying the Spielberg name.”